San Diego

When I was eleven, we went on our first big family trip. Dad had a meeting or two in Hawaii and instead of leaving Ellen and me back home with Grandma like he had for so many other meetings, he took us along. I was so excited. To this day Hawaii is one of my favorite places. I don't remember much of this first visit but I returned somewhere around 16 or 17 and after visiting a rice farm in a deep, jungly valley, something clicked, life made sense, and my life was ruined forever. The point of today's rant though, is San Diego. We crossed the country, flying into Los Angeles and dipping down to San Diego. I have a few snippet memories of old San-D and these include lots of ice cream cones and having lunch on a flowery patio on Coronado Island. I remember that Ellen was in a bad mood and I tried to make her laugh by pouring water on my head. She did not laugh and I remember being cold. We bought two giant fleece jackets that the four of us still wear around the house when it's chilly. I have fond, fuzzy memories of this place and so I convinced Mattie it would be a stop worth stopping for.

I'm a little mad at San Diego. Only a little. It's a very pretty place with gorgeous weather and lots of kind, attractive people. It smells good and it's clean. That's nice. As a whole I enjoyed our 16 hours there. We drove through the afternoon from Vegas to San-D. The drive was fine but traffic came to a near standstill about 70 miles from the city. Then it picked up, moving down the highway bumper to bumper but going 60 mph. I've never been so stressed behind the wheel. You can't drive that close, that fast. I've never felt so out of control of any situation I've encountered on the road nor have I ever before considered rear-ending someone just for an excuse to pull over and let it all pass by. For an hour and a half, I held a death-grip on my steering wheel and plowed through mayhem. I don't have words for the stress level. It was wild. I'm not kidding, we cheated death (or just expensive repairs) at least 16 times in one hour. I continuously braced myself for impact and just narrowly got by. My nerves were shot when we finally made it to our hotel and my hands were shaking. I can not believe the way these people drive.

We met Mattie's friend Peter for dinner that night. And even though I ranted about my perilous afternoon and was visibly bothered, Peter still made me drive. He lives there! How about you drive me, Spartacus, huh? Been driving for days.
We found ourselves at a beach pub, ironically run by a fella from South Carolina who had decorated the place in USC colors and covered the walls with jerseys of the Clowney and Lattimore caliber players. I felt right at home and proudly announced my heritage to the waitstaff who seemed genuinely pleased about my excitement. We wandered a bit and took a night stroll on the beach before I dumped that Peter out by his car and said Sayonara.

We woke up the next day and became pleasantly lost in the city, giving ourselves a nice tour of the place and reestablishing the pretty memories I have. I would live in San Diego... if it weren't for the traffic. It's a shame really. It's a beautiful place but the amount of people driving around is a deal-breaker. We wound up back in the beachy area but because it was the first day of the World Cup, it took us three hours to find, order, eat, and pay for lunch. There was no time left for exploring after all this so we hopped back in the car and trucked it to Los Angeles.

We forgot to take pictures of San Diego. I was distracted trying not to die on the roads and getting out of the car was like having another chance at life handed to you for free. I needed to be in the moment. Didn't know if I was going to get many more.